CAG denies auditors shifted over critical reports on govt schemes

Tribune News Service

Sandeep Dikshit

New Delhi, October 13

Faced with a controversy over the transfer of auditors who had submitted reports critical of the Modi government’s flagship Bharatmala and Ayushman Bharat schemes, the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) on Friday said transfers and postings were a matter of administrative convenience and “attaching ulterior motives to these is highly presumptuous”.

The CAG had reported a 1,400 per cent increase in cost as well as inconsistencies in tendering for the Dwarka Expressway project and exposed lakhs of claims under the Ayushman Bharat health insurance being made by beneficiaries linked to a single mobile number. Officials were reportedly transferred last month. The CAG, however, did not respond to reports stating that the officials had passed verbal orders to “stop all field work”.

In a statement, the CAG said audit reports went through multiple hands before being approved by the highest authority for tabling in Parliament. The statement followed Congress criticism over the transfer of auditors Atoorva Sinha and Dattaprasad Surkayant Shirsa, who had headed the audit into the Dwarka Expressway project, and Ashok Sinha, who was responsible for the audit of the Ayushman Bharat scheme.

The CAG sought to address opposition criticism by stating that both reports were presented to the President after approval at the highest level, laid before Parliament, and were in the public domain. “To attribute any malfeasance to these routine transfers driven by administrative requirements is completely incorrect,” it said.

Audit reports approved by CAG GC Murmu had attained an all-time high of 173 audit reports in 2022-23, 165 in 2021-22 and 123 in the preceding year, it said. Murmu, a 1985-batch Gujarat cadre officer, was appointed as CAG in 2020 after an unusual stint as the first Lieutenant Governor of Ladakh following the abrogation of Article 370. He had been moved to the post after serving as Revenue Secretary at the Centre.

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